When I read about The Dark Urge origin path in Baldur’s Gate 3, I knew where I was going to take my character. Everything I read about the path seemed like exactly what I wanted. You lost your memory and all you can remember is your thirst for blood and violence. Extra narration pulls you towards extra choices that let you be extra evil. Rather than breaking the system or being an afterthought, going fully evil in Baldur’s Gate 3 is a well-designed route through the game.
And I am absolutely struggling to do it. I suck ass at being evil in this game. I’m a failure at burning the world to the ground. I’m just no good at being just no good. As much as I want to be a Homelander-level villain, a truly horrifying force of hate, I just keep choosing to do the right thing instead. My entire character is based around having literal dark urges but when it’s time to click on those choices, my mouse finger is hesitating, baby. I can’t do it!
This isn’t because I’m a good person. Far from it. I’m selfish. I’m impatient. I’m rude. I’m petty. I’m not evil, per se, but I’m definitely an example of how banal everyday actions can compile into a life of causing more bad than good. I’ve even written about how I tend to be a better person in video games than in real life. If anything, Baldur’s Gate 3 should be a release for my worst impulses. All that hate and greed can be levelled upon fake, imaginary people.
Except, no. I have to be good like a fucking loser.
I even designed my character to look and feel evil. He’s Dragonborn, which looks pretty evil. Is that offensive to Dragonborn people? I don’t know. Probably. They’re not real. Is there a discourse in there I don’t want to have? Absolutely. But when you’ve got the face of a dragon, ya’ look evil. I also named him “Salas” which, while a corny first-draft name, sounds pretty evil. A lot of “s” sounds makes my big bad dragon boy sound like a snake in my head. Also ran up Salas’ intelligence and charisma scores to make him a manipulative piece of shit.
But here we are, pathetically making friends and influencing people to do their best. Every time Salas is presented with a choice to mess people’s shit up, it’s often so jarring that I… I just can’t. It feels bad. I know I can ruin this world, but when an NPC is looking you in the eye, it’s hard to pull the trigger on doom. I gotta save villages. I gotta negotiate peace. I might as well set up a table and sell baked goods to donate to the local orphanage. I hate myself so much. Why can’t I use that hate for bad rather than good?
Some of this is because of the pure horror of some of the choices The Dark Urge presents. Most of them are like, “Heh, wouldn’t it be cool to start a war?” Which is horrible, sure. But also there are a few moments pretty early on where you run across a small animal and you’re given an option. You can guess what that option is. The narrator is like, “Yes… do it. Kill it! Make it suffer!” and I’m over here, like, “Can’t our dark urge be just maintaining the status quo?”
Don’t get me wrong: I tried! I wanted to satisfy that dark urge in Salas, so I did kill one of the animals when presented with the choice. …And I felt awful about it for hours. It’s not a real animal. I’ve never killed a real animal. It was literally part of the storyline that I’ve intentionally chosen for my character, but murdering a fake squirrel made of polygons just didn’t sit right with me.
Meanwhile, it’s hard to be evil when everyone tells you they don’t like it. I mean, I just want to bring complete darkness to the world. I don’t want the gaudy vampire and the open mic wizard in my party to be weird about it. They’re already weird about a lot of things, I don’t need them breathing down my neck because I didn’t do evil the way they like. Meanwhile, Salas keeps trying to impress Lae’zel by looking back at her every time he’s about to hit something with a spell, like, “This okay?”
That’s the other thing: People really have different ideas of what they think is evil. It’s like, can’t one of you go on this journey with me? Can’t one of the companion characters just be cool with me telling a group of religious people to run to their deaths? I felt bad about that one, too.
Rather than dark urges in my head, Salas is beginning to feel like he can’t resist his good urges. Same story. He woke up with his memories gone. He knows he’s killed a lot of people. But something in his soul just won’t let him do the evil acts he wants to do. He would love to let a character kill a child in a side quest. He would adore being able to do that. But then he’s overcome with a sense of justice and tastes bile in his mouth as he does the right thing.
God I love this game.